National Federation of Postal Employees

NO OBJECTION CERTIFICATE (NOC) IS NOT REQUIRED FOR GOVT EMPLOYEES TO OBTAIN PASSPORT 

Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar

            New Delhi: No Objection Certificate (NOC) is not now a mandatory requirement for government employees to get a passport.

            To streamline and check the undue delay in getting passports to the government employees, the Ministry of External Affairs has relaxed provisions for issue of passport and asked the government employees to attach the copy of prior intimation letter submitted by the government employees to their controlling authority before applied for passport.

            The Ministry of External Affairs has recently issued an Office Memorandum No.VI/401/01/05/2014 making the ‘Prior Intimation Letter’ valid proof like ‘No Objection Certificate (NOC)’ to obtain passport for government employees, public sector undertakings (PSU) employees and autonomous body employees.

            Government employees, who applies for passport with ‘Prior Intimation Letter’, they do not need to police verification.

            The above provision is applied for getting passport only not for VISA, the government employees are required to obtain ‘No Objection Certificate (NOC)’ from their departments concerned for getting VISA from foreign embassies for travelling abroad as per CCS (Conduct) Rules and the instructions have been issued by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) from time to time.

INCOME TAX FORMS SIMPLIFIED, DATE FOR FILING RETURNS EXTENDED TO AUG 31

            The finance ministry on Sunday came out with a new three-page income tax return (ITR) forms, in a corrective measure after facing strong criticism from public. The new forms no longer require mandatory disclosure of foreign trips and dormant bank accounts as mandated by the previous form. The new form can be submitted till August           31 this year instead of the regular July 31 deadline.

The new forms will be up on websites for e-filing from the third week of June since the government is yet to update the software with new proposed changes.

            According to a finance ministry statement, the new forms — ITR 2 and ITR 2A — will have only three pages and other details will have to be filled in schedules, as per each individuals criterion and income.

            The revenue department has also proposed to come out with a new ITR 2A form, which can be filed by an individual or HUF, who does not have capital gains, income from business/ profession or foreign asset/foreign income. This according to the government will cover a maximum number of tax payers.

            On the major sticky issues like details and source of income of foreign trips and bank accounts, the government eased the disclosures sought earlier and said: "It is now proposed that only passport number, if available, would be required to be given in forms ITR-2 and ITR-2A. Details of foreign trips or expenditure thereon are not required to be furnished."

            For information related to bank accounts the ministry has decided to ask information of only those dormant accounts which were operational during the last three years, from the filing year.

"As regards bank account details in all these forms, only the IFS code, account number of all the current/savings account which are held at any time during the previous year will be required to be filled-up. The balance in accounts will not be required to be furnished," the statement added.

            Further clarifying for non Indian citizen individuals, the income tax department said that it is not mandatory for them to report the foreign assets acquired by him during the previous years in which he was non-resident and if no income is derived from such assets during the relevant previous year.

            "Individuals having exempt income without any ceiling (other than agricultural income exceeding Rs 5,000) can now file form ITR 1 (Sahaj). Similar simplification is also proposed for individuals/HUF in respect of form ITR 4S (Sugam)," the statement added.

            Following the controversy over the ITR forms for assessment year 2015-16, which sought details of bank accounts and foreign visits, the revenue department had put them on hold.

            The ITR forms, which was notified last month by the CBDT for the current assessment year, had specific columns for banks accounts, IFSC Code, names of joint account holders and foreign visits, including the ones paid by companies.